“The old idea that journalism should be neutral and never take sides with either side is just rubbish.
As a journalist, your neutrality and impartiality must be exercised from the side of those who suffer ”.
This is how Robert Fisk expressed himself in the recent documentary,
This Is Not A Movie
, by director Yung Chang, which revolved around the figure of the legendary British correspondent in the Middle East to raise the complex relationship between journalism and the truth.
Fisk has died of a heart failure at St. Vincent's Hospital in Dublin, where he was transferred last Friday from his home in the Irish capital.
His most renowned work was done in recent decades as a Beirut-based correspondent for the British newspaper
The Independent
.
He joined its staff in 1989, after working for
The Times
for a few years
and covering for this newspaper.
the conflict in Northern Ireland (known as
The Troubles
, the riots) or the Carnation Revolution in Portugal in the 1970s.
Critical of fellow professionals who reported on or gave their opinion on the most troubled region on the planet without getting up from their newsrooms, Fisk was a direct witness to the bloody civil war in Lebanon, the 1979 Iranian revolution, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the fight of the Taliban or the conflict between Iran and Iraq.
As he deepened his knowledge of the area, his views on Western governments, and especially against the United States and Israel, became more acid and controversial.
Brilliant writer, an Arabist, knowledgeable about the language and customs of the world in which he spent more than half his life, Fisk received numerous awards throughout his career, such as British International Journalist of the Year (in seven occasions) or the Amnesty International Press Award (twice).
He is the author of acclaimed books such as The Great War for Civilization: The Conquest of the Middle East (Ed. Destino) or
Pity The Nation: Lebanon at War
(Lament for the Nation: Lebanon at War).
He was the first journalist to interview a then-unknown Osama Bin Laden in his mountainous refuge in Afghanistan.
“Brave, independent, determined and firmly committed to uncovering the truth and reality at any cost.
Robert Fisk was the best journalist of his generation, "said the managing director of
The Independent
, Chiristian Broughton, upon hearing the news of the death.
Fisk loved Beirut, and linked his fate to that of the city during the harshest moments of its bloody civil war.
Among his fellow professionals, who fully respected his integrity and seniority, he was known simply as "Fisk" or "Fisky."
He was one of the first journalists to personally witness the massacre in the Sabra and Shatila camps, where hundreds of Palestinian refugees were murdered in cold blood by Christian militias.
The population of the area felt more admiration than the western public towards the work of a professional, proud and provocative, who always took the side of the weakest.
When he traveled to Afghanistan, after the attacks on the Twin Towers in New York, he was attacked by a group of Afghan refugees on the border with Pakistan.
Fisk turned the incident into front-page news in which he analyzed, in a depersonalized way, the causes of so much anger.
“I realized that they were all men and boys whose brutality was completely the product of others.
Of us, who armed them to fight the Russians but ignored their suffering and laughed at their civil war, "he wrote.
He was not always right, but he held firm to his convictions.
Many of his critics accused him of excessive condescension to the Syrian regime of Bashar al Assad, which always allowed him access to areas of the country that were banned from other journalists.
Fisk came to sow doubts about the authorship of the Government when humanity learned of the use of chemical agents against the civil population in Douma, the Damascus neighborhood.
Born in the English town of Kent, the son of a father expelled from the army for refusing to command a firing squad that was going to execute a British soldier, he himself has recognized how he distanced himself from his father as he became more “nationalistic , almost fascist ... ”and yet, how her love for history was inherited from him.
He chose, however, that his homeland was Ireland, and ended up acquiring that nationality.
"The world has lost one of its most brilliant commentators," said Irish President Michael D. Higgins.
"The temple of truth has disappeared," said Marwan Chukri, the director of the International Press Center of the Ministry of Information, in Beirut.
